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7.31.2012

July 18. I pulled into the driveway and my mom was literally so excited she started jumping up and down, pulled out her phone, and snapped a pic of me pulling in. Gotta love being loved :) annnnnddd this is what they posted in the front driveway, where I always park.

The first day back in the us. One day to just kind of relax and adjust ourselves before we made the drive back home. It was strange to be driving back on our side of the road somehow. And...it was hot!! We'd been acclimated to sixty to seventy degree weather and now we were sweltering through high ninety degree humidity. Talk about culture shock!

july 16. woke up at like 4:30 or something like that. too early, that's all i remember. still dark out. checked out of the hotel and caught a cab bound for the dublin airport.

we flew to london and i saw some olympians...and big ben, some double decker buses, red telephone booths, westminister abbey, the london eye, and got my pic taken with some bobbys! goal of my trip completed lol!

left london around 3, our flight left about eight or so, and got into newark around 11pm. talk about being completely zonked!

the second day of convention. we got great seats, right on a balcony! anyways, we found these really cool stairs! a double staircase that i think escher or william curtis rolf would envy quite possibly.

and who knew a photobomber could actually add to the mystery of the photo? i think this one's great!

the weirdest thing. whenever i go to a convention in my home district, i know about 75% of the people. this convention, i hardly knew anyone...but it was still amazing! 9000 people who are mostly strangers, and you can just drum up a conversation with them and feel as if you've known them forever!

thursday we spent some time in the ministry inviting people around dublin to the convention the following three days! what a great experience! my favorite was when we were all on the tram, all crammed full of witnesses, and a few other people, just feeling this incredible surge of happiness.

7.24.2012

i like to think of myself as a creative thinker. maybe i'm not, but don't go bursting my bubble. anyways. the group was thinking of ditching the rental car and just taking another tour of dublin. this girl, however, stuck with the car idea, complaining the whole way about her poor wittle bum foot (haha), and succeeded in applying more pro's than con's to the situation, succeeding with a rental car, a cross-country roadtrip (and back! in ONE day!), and a pretty amazing spot to eat lunch.

where we went: the dingle peninsula.

what we saw: lots and lots of sky and green, green grass. also, lots of sheep.

july 10. don't do a walking tour with a bum foot. ouch. i somehow made it through several "death marches" around dublin, and ended up in a pretty foul mood by the end of them.

on a high note, i got to see (i think) the oldest biblical papyrus in existence. a portion of the book of john, it was penned only fifty years after john wrote the book of john! pretty amazing! i had goosebumps looking at it. they don't let you take pictures of it, however, so you will just have to trust me when i say that it was amazing, and know that if i could've taken pictures of it, i would've gone snap-happy and it would be the photo of the day..

monday we arrived back in dublin in the afternoon and were all so tired from travelling we decided to all take "cat naps" after we checked into the hotel. we explored the grounds after our naps and in between dinner and found them quite lovely. then we ate dinner; we were all quite deliriously hungry!

you can't see the view very well in the picture, but it was really great!

what a place! this castle was built as part of the Norman conquest to subdue the unruly Northern England, and was used in the first World World to imprison conscientious objectors. it is rumored to be the oldest castle in England.

still a little jet lagged. Friday we headed to Durham to see the cathedral and castle there. such a quaint little place. like most places I've visited in Europe. cobblestone streets, ancient stone buildings, and oh! the american "embassy," Starbucks.

we walked along the river and up to the cathedral. a very impressively built structure. we then went and had fish and chips and pots of tea. my mouth still waters to think of those amazing bites of crispy cod and soft chips with vinegar and lemon.

after, we headed to the Durham castle, but, alas! it was closed for a wedding. disappointing. i know.

7.22.2012

july 5, 2012. the worst jetlag day ever. we landed at the local time of about 9:30 am. the four of us had not slept well on the red eye, prolly about 3 hours apiece, and so you can guess we were not so bright eyed travellers at this point in time. we freshened up a bit, got our rental car, which was a "larger car" being a nissan micra. not such a big car by american standards. we crowded in with all our baggage like four uncomfortable sardines in a tin and headed out to explore dublin. by exploring i mean we toured the guinness factory and hit a cop car. not at the same time, and not linked. but all in the same day. then, it was back to the dublin airport for a flight to newcastle!

i left the house mid-morning, triple-checked i had my passport and clean underwear and hopped in my little car to start off our journey. i love travelling but hate leaving, despite the fact that i get that nervous anticipation with the unanswered question in my mind of, "what will happen on this journey?"

over the next three days we would be travelling, with little sleep, and high hopes.

7.21.2012

sarah and i went out to dinner and shopping for one last "hurrah" before i left to fly over the sea for two weeks. i really missed her those two weeks! but nevertheless, i had a blast over in ireland and england. but more on that later.

was july 1. a sunday. started out nice, then got rainy. but we still got ice cream. i also had the privilege to photograph a pretty pregnant lady! i can't wait to meet little lydia in the very very near future!

anyways. like i said, we got ice cream. it was raining, then cleared up, then rainy. schizophrenic, the weather was. like ireland's weather. we saw an impressive rainbow, and then i was impressed by the raindrops on the sunroof.

so i totally have 22 posts to catch up on. mostly unwritten. everything after a long journey seems to be disorganized, and i hope that i'm not the only one who feels like this. laundry that needs to be put away, posts to write, photos to organize (i took about 900 on the trip, eek), etc. and i'm soooo tired! so i'm going to do my best over the next few days to catch you readers and lookers up on my photo a day project :)

day 75 was june 30. yeah, that's right, last month.

i know i've posted a bunch before about bob (you say, "what about bob?"), but here's another. just face it. we all need our daily dose of cute.